More than 30 cities in China have applied to build new urban rail networks as a way of combating increasing road congestion.

The cities include Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Hangzhou, Nanjing, and Chengdu.

At the same time, the national five-year plan allows for more than 7,000 miles of new high speed lines and 10,000 miles of conventional rail lines to be built at a cost of around £8billion annually.

Among them will be the Shanghai-Hangzhou high-speed maglev railway and the Beijing-Shanghai high-speed rail line.

The Chinese government is insisting that 70% of local technology and equipment must be included in all rail projects.

It has begun moves to open up the home industry to private investment from abroad.

Some of the people involved in Chinese rail projects will at the China RailWorld conference in Beijing in October 2006.

19-20 October 2006. Thursday-Friday, China RailWorld conference, Beijing. info at chinarailworld.com

For more news of the Beijing-Shanghai high-speed rail route see
http://www.railway-technology.com/projects/beijing/